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(Tenured Radical)

Sunday, June 25, 2006

Written Off


Jim Hu offers a skeptical take on UC Santa Cruz events, strongly sympathetic to Denton. Among other interesting things, he says:

So...she becomes chancellor at UCSC, taking a large but not unusual compensation package which includes a trailing spouse position. She arrives, full of hope that she can do something worth moving herself and Kalonji from Seattle. In less than a year, she's got students stopping her car, people throwing things through her windows and pounding on her door demanding attention. No honeymoon while she gets her bearings and works out where she wants to lead the university. No support from the community she was led to believe wanted her leadership. People are acting like she's there for the money...the same people who criticize her for her lack of attention to her appearance. She's become a symbol for every academic who others think is overpaid, for lesbians, for the clash of science and engineering with liberal arts, for diversity efforts, and who knows what else. From all that has been written about her, can we tell how she planned to do anything at UCSC? Or was she written off as an archetype?